When Family Alcoholism Impacts Relationships
“Loving connection is the only safety nature ever offers us.” -Dr. Sue Johnson
We aren’t big mammals with sharp talons or teeth. We are social creatures and pack animals that rely on our connections and communities for survival. Even if we sometimes feel alone or isolated, there is a vast network of people who help us in small and big ways: making our clothes, making scientific advances that we benefit from, picking fruit in another state or country to end up in our grocery store shelves. An extensive network of interdependence allows us to thrive. Relationships are the bedrock of being human. They are also often a place where many people develop their most profound wounds.
I recently finished Hold Me Tight, a relationship guidebook, by Dr. Sue Johnson. One of my primary takeaways from the book was the importance of expressing one’s needs. This simple message: express your needs, can have a profound impact on the health and wellbeing of a relationship. It seems silly, but of course, we need to express our needs. How else would our partner know how we are feeling or what feels good to us? How do we learn that we don’t get to express our needs?
The reasons it may be so hard to define and express emotional or attachment needs are evident in the traits of an “adult child.” That is the name the twelve-step program ACA, or Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families gives to those raised in an alcoholic, chaotic, or dysfunctional home. Whenever I bring up ACA to my therapy clients, I usually provide the caveat that adding “…and dysfunctional families” really broadens the scope of who could benefit from its lessons. ACA provides a “Laundry List” of traits that people who grew up in turbulent homes experienced. These traits are general attitudes and strategies towards life and relationships with others that chaos steeps into our emotional landscape creating turbulence down the road.
Early childhood relationships create a foundation of understanding for relating to others. If there is unpredictability or fear present in those connections, we learn to attach these things to relationships themselves. Ways of relating become maladaptive in adult relationships when constantly responding to fear, real or perceived, and expecting a negative outcome.
Several traits on the ACA Laundry List exemplify why asking for what we need in a relationship may be a challenge when there is a history of early attachment wounding:
ACA Trait 2: We became approval seekers and lost our identity in the process.
Asking for what you need is risky business. The person we are asking is in no way obliged to fulfill those needs and we very well may be rejected. If we are approval seekers, it’s way easier to figure out what the other person needs and just do that rather than risk the vulnerability of saying what we need.
Generally, children who grow up in alcoholic homes are very good at intuitively knowing what a parent may need and adjusting their behavior accordingly. These can often be unconscious responses. One way to curb this behavior is to check in with yourself if you feel like that’s not what you really meant to do or wanted to do. This is behavior colloquially called “people-pleasing.” If you are a chronic “people pleaser,” it might be worth asking yourself, “What am I trying to get by pleasing this person?” We are mammals whose general drive is towards safety. It may be worth checking in to see if there is something that doesn’t feel safe about disapproval or disappointment.
ACA Trait 6: “We have an overdeveloped sense of responsibility and it is easier for us to be concerned with others rather than ourselves; this enables us not to look too closely at our own faults.”
When we don’t look too closely at our own faults, we may also not look too closely at our needs or vulnerabilities. In a chaotic environment, this is a very powerful defense. We are scanning the environment for danger; we don’t have time to scan internally. This is especially true if there is exposure to traumatic incidents. Self-sufficiency to this degree can promote disconnection from others because we don’t reach out for help. In a chaotic environment, asking for what you need can be dangerous because there may be punishment, embarrassment, or disapproval on the other side. In extreme cases, abuse might even be the result of asking for help or expressing needs.
People who were raised in chaotic homes are often extremely self-reliant, asking for what you need seems superfluous to getting things done and an unnecessary impediment. “Why would I ask for what I need? I can do it myself.” However, relationships depend on mutual reliance: interdependence.
I appreciate Dr. Johnson’s assertion that “we persist in defining healthy people as those who do not need.” Review of this ACA trait is sometimes met with wide eyes and confusion. We have a culture in the United States that very much values an overdeveloped sense of responsibility. What Dr. Johnson highlights, is that its overdevelopment is not necessarily something that allows for our primary defense, motivator, and meaning maker: connection and love. When we are overly independent, we don’t leave space to share with others. She goes on to say, “We are building a culture of separateness that is at odds with our biology.” It is advantageous to maintain a connection to our own biology in order to connect with others.
ACA Trait 11: We judge ourselves harshly and have a very low sense of self-esteem.
Children who grow up in abusive homes often learn to abuse themselves. If the healthy dialogue was not modeled, and if getting things done involved speaking harshly, it only follows that that is the inner dialogue people develop. “What’s wrong with me?” or “I’m not good enough” are common refrains I hear in therapy. What’s important to note is that these inner messages are often learned responses and habitual reactions. They can be changed with practice.
In her book, Dr. Johnson writes that her clients often feel relief knowing nothing is wrong with them when expressing fears or longings. Many of our needs in relationships are the same ones that others share: the need to be seen, heard, cared for, and of course basic biological needs. There is nothing wrong with having or expressing these needs.
If we have an overdeveloped sense of responsibility, it’s easy to judge ourselves for having these needs.
There may be larger family or cultural systems dynamics at play that prevents us from sharing fears or longings. Certainly, the “stiff upper lip” mentality prevents vulnerability, which is so crucial to connection.
Something as asking ourselves once a day: What do I need right now? Can be a powerful way to re-organize this entrenched mental pattern.
ACA Trait 12: We are dependent personalities who are terrified of abandonment and will do anything to hold on to a relationship in order not to experience painful abandonment feelings, which we received from living with sick people who were never there emotionally for us.
“Trauma is always a couple issue.” -Dr. Sue Johnson
Trauma not only impacts our past but also our present and how we relate to those present in our lives. As we begin to heal the past and learn new ways of relating to both ourselves and others, we are able to be more responsive to both sets of needs. We build compassion for ourselves and others. We can also begin to forgive the players and actions of the past. Dr. Johnson writes that “the best predictor of the impact of trauma is not the severity of the event, but whether we can seek and take comfort from others.” Can we risk being vulnerable and asking for help when we need it?
“We are learning to love ourselves. We can do this.” -Adult Children of Alcoholics, Big Red Book
When I got into the practice of asking for what I needed, after reading Dr. Johnson’s work, I realized that often what I need is pretty simple: attention, a hug, being listened to and heard. Asking for small needs first is good practice. As we come to rely more on our partners or grow in commitment, these needs may grow. Sometimes we ask for things in relationships without using our words, like gently grabbing our partner’s hand to hold.
Asking for what you need is not demanding what you want or blaming a partner for not being a mind reader. Asking for what you need is not, “I need you to clean up around here.” It is, “I need help and feel pretty exhausted today.” Asking for what I need involves digging deep to identify the emotions that are present, and identifying if there is some action or response that can support those feelings. When we love someone, generally these are needs we willingly fulfill. Asking for what you need is a risk worth taking.
